This message by Francis Chan will mess with you.
A trip to a third world country, in my case Haiti, will show you just how much syncretism we practice in America.
Here are some of the gods we mix with our faith.
– The safety god
– The comfort god
– The performance god
– The money god
– The staff god
– The building god
– The schedule god
I don’t point those things out to bring judgement on anyone. In fact, these are my gods, too. As I’m re-entering my culture I need to wrestle with these gods in light of the teachings of Moses in Deuteronomy.
The thing that God (the real God!) kept hitting me over the head with while in Haiti is that I live a life of dependency and faith avoidance. Before the trip, as I wrote about, I felt like God was calling me out and asking if I truly believed the things I told people I believed in.
I hope I lived up to the challenge.
And it turns out, coming home presents a new challenge of faith.
As Francis points out in this message, dangerous things could happen if we would just be obedient to what God teaches us in the Bible. Our faith can change things. But so much of that is conditional on whether or not the people are lifting God up above these false gods.
The fact is that believing the Bible is actually true is a step of faith.
But putting your complete faith in Christ and living as though the things of the Bible will happen in your midst… now that is dangerous.
The reality I am trying to reconcile is that I know God is calling me to live a dangerous life. But the life I know isn’t all that dangerous.